Markovich/A.M.P.’s Emotive Force – project-based alternapop

It’s nice to see Creative Commons licenses being used for undertakings that push the limits of collaboration and remote recording technologies, and Markovich/A Music Project (A.M.P.) are doing their best to test those limits.

As the name suggests, they are a music project more than a band, and although they aim to make pretty straight-up downtempo and trip-hop, there’s still enough variation in there to make for some very interesting listening.

The Emotive Force EP is a free sampler of tracks taken from the album of the same name. Markovich pride themselves on having a fluid membership, with band members in different countries, communicating and collaborating via the internet. For these particular songs, the beats and vocal choices are tremendously well-suited to all the styles that Markovich have attempted, and they’ve done really well creating a mood, even through the lack of a particular theme and the fact that the band members are scattered everywhere. Reggae-trip groovers like “Gone Insane” blend seamlessly with more glitch-influenced electronica like “Inner Sleep” and “Tear Drops Mix M.” Round it out with a couple of trip-hoppy alternative numbers (“My Wish” and “Unkind Waters”), and you have a nice little EP going on. There’s nothing tremendously wild or daring here, but at the same time these songs have a very pleasant thread connecting them.

In terms of production, you can see what they’re trying to do with this collection, and clearly this is a project in constant evolution. The performances (especially from earlier recordings) can be a bit rough around the edges in places, but the talent and skill are clearly there, and that casts a very forgiving light on musicians who are doing their best to innovate and develop new styles of recording.

If you like this EP, there are more songs to be downloaded from the group’s official site, but be warned – organization doesn’t seem to be their forte. You’ll find some songs on the EP that don’t appear to be on the album, or appear to be on other albums. Some songs have more than one version, sometimes with varying qualities and bit rates, and so forth. Still, I think it’s certainly worth a dig around, because the gems you’ll find are worth the trouble it takes to unearth them.

Latest

This page uses third party cookies, for purposes such as targeting of ads through Google Analytics and Google Ads. By continuing to browse the site you are agreeing to our use of cookies and Privacy Policy. More info:
Privacy Policy